Halloween!

With Halloween falling on a Monday night, we got the girls to bed early on Sunday night so they would be rested and ready to trick-or-treat! After the girls got home from school, Sofia announced "tonight is Halloween and we get to trick-or-treat!" to which I told her that we actually had plans and that I'd forgotten it was Halloween. CK is usually the one who jokes around, so she nearly started crying! I quickly reassured her that I was kidding. The girls decided months ago that they wanted to be Star Wars characters - Sofia as Boba Fett and Olivia as Queen Amidala. I went ahead and bought the costumes months ago so they could dress up and play in them well before last night, which they did. So they got a lot of use out of their costumes, however, I think by the time October arrived neither one of them were super excited to use the costumes. I never suggested going another route, and once they were home Monday from school they were very excited to get in their costumes.

The four of us ate chicken chili and corn bread and then the girls got into their costumes. Sofia's Boba Fett costume took her less than 5 minutes to get into and she was immediately in character with her jet pack and bounty hunter gun! She was super excited! Olivia got into her Queen Amidala costume and then I painted her face white and added one red dot (bright red lipstick) on each cheek as well as red lipstick to her lips. I had to add a pretty thick layer of white face paint, so it stayed wet for longer than I expected but looked great! I assumed it would look perfect for the pictures I planned to take after they were both dressed and then would be all over by the end of the evening.

The girls were all set and we put the "hot dog" costume on Buddy and then headed out front to take pictures. It was actually pretty warm outside and still in the low 80s and would be in the 70s by the end of our trick-or-treating adventure. We took pictures of the girls and Buddy and then joined up with Antonio, Luca and Brandon! The group headed to Brandon's house for the first official "trick-or-treat" candy. Dana gave each the kids a full-sized candy bars! Yum! From there, we headed down the neighborhood toward Mitzi's house, with Antonio and Olivia leading the way from door to door. Since it was just 6:30pm, most of our neighbors weren't home yet. Plus, we don't get any trick-or-treaters other than our kids, so we don't even buy candy!

After we visited Mitzi, the kids knocked on Peter and Tammy's front door and Calista came out to join all of us. Calista was dressed as a princess and is just a few months younger than Olivia. She's so cute and was so excited to go trick-or-treating! We regrouped by our neighborhood entrance and walked across the street to the neighborhood we have visited on nearly every Halloween since we moved here eight years ago. Its a U-shaped neighborhood that is the perfect size for trick-or-treating and many of the houses are decorated and owners sit in front of their homes to pass out candy. Olivia, Calista and Antonio raced from door to door, running across yards, while Sofia and Brandon stuck together and walked and Luca got a ride in his stroller, then would get out and walk to each door to say "trick-or-treat" in the cutest voice! I was surprised at how many of the houses were dark without anyone opening doors and passing out candy. Usually most of the homes occupied and passing out candy, but last night there were nearly half of the homes that were dark. I know a lot of Sofia's classmates actually celebrated on Saturday in their neighborhoods or went to a church "Trunk or Treat." About halfway around the neighborhood, Sofia started keeping up with Luca and would walk with him to each door and tell him "What do you say?" It was absolutely adorable! Meanwhile, Calista, Antonio and Olivia kept up running from house to house while Brandon stuck in between the groups. There also seemed to be less kids dressed up and trick-or-treating in the neighborhood than in past years.

When we were just over halfway through the neighborhood, Olivia was done! She sat down on the side of the sidewalk, dug through her candy and said "I need water and want to go home." Thankfully Calista's Grandpa arrived shortly afterwards to take Calista, Tammy and Peter home and CK and Olivia caught a ride across the street with them. It probably saved a lot of tears and sadness. The rest of us continued through the neighborhood collecting candy and by the end of the neighborhood Marco had the minivan and all the kids climbed in. I walked back across the street with Todd and met up with Sofia and Brandon. We headed inside to find CK and a showered and pajama-wearing Olivia figuring out what candy to eat next. They said they were enjoying a "candy eating party" together. Sofia was excited to dig into her candy and we let her have a few pieces before getting a shower and into her pajamas. Both girls collected a little over half of their candy containers of candy, which is a lot less than past years, but probably not a bad thing. Such a fun night!

A close-up of Queen Amidala

Sofia as Boba Fett and Olivia as Queen Amidala!

Boba Fett

Love this picture of Sofia!

Ready to collect candy!

The girls and me

The girls with Antonio

With Antonio and Luca

The first house of Halloween 2016

Dana passing out candy to the kids

The gang with Miss Mitzi

Harley is ready to trick-or-treat in his pumpkin costume

Calista joins the group and they are ready to gather some candy!

In front of one of the houses

Trick-or-treat!!

Sofia and Luca doing the rounds together

The candy party!

Sofia going through her candies

Storybook Pumpkins

While we were at Market Street picking out the "perfect" jack-o-lantern pumpkin, the girls also picked out two smaller pumpkins for them to paint for their school's library "Storybook Pumpkins." This is Mrs. Keller's first year as our school's librarian and she told each class that she would give each student a small prize if they wanted to paint and decorate a pumpkin from their favorite book or story. These pumpkins would be displayed in the library until Halloween. At first, the girls weren't interested in participating, but I think once they visited the library and saw how many pumpkins there were, they both changed their minds. So, Olivia picked out a pie pumpkin and Sofia picked out a small decorative pumpkin and they both wanted to make dragons. Sofia explained that her dragon is from Harry Potter Book 4 and should be green, while Olivia just wanted a red dragon. I reminded her of the book "Not Your Typical Dragon" which is about a dragon that breaths everything but fire, including stuffed animals and marshmallows. It's really a sweet story, but I think the main dragon is actually green. Oh well!

After both girls were done cleaning out and carving their jack-o-lanterns, they immediately turned to painting their smaller pumpkins. Sofia painted hers, followed by Olivia. Once they were dry, Sofia moved inside with her green pumpkin and started drawing and designing the dragon's wings, painting a toilet paper roll to match the dragon's color, and figuring out a tail and eyes. She actually made and glued her entire dragon all by herself without any assistance from me or CK! She also did it pretty quickly! She insisted on making legs for it, which I tried to talk her out of, but once she made them and attached them, they really looked cute!

It was soon bedtime for the girls and Olivia's painted pumpkin hadn't been touched. I knew she would be upset in the morning when she saw Sofia's dragon done and her's not even started. So, I looked at Sofia's dragon to make the wings, tail and head and it turned out nearly as cute as Sofia's, although it took me forever! I couldn't get the stem off, so ended up whacking it with a hammer, which worked but removed a small chunk of pumpkin at the top. It started oozing, so I poured glue to cover the area thinking it would dry overnight. Unfortunately it didn't work and I knew that we weren't supposed to bring in a cut pumpkin since it starts to decay faster. Hopefully it won't be an issue! I kept working and found a sheet each of yellow, red and orange tissue paper and cut and added it to the dragon's mouths as fire. Sofia planned to add fire by using construction paper, but the dragon heads weren't glued on very well and I figured it would cause them to fall off, so decided to use tissue paper. They turned out so cute and I know Sofia was really proud to have made hers all by herself.

We headed to school a little early so we could drop off their pumpkins in the library and fill out the paper that described what book their pumpkins are from, and what the character does in the book. We added them to Mrs. Keller's collection of decorated pumpkins and I said goodbye to the girls so they could head off to class.

Sofia's drawing of her idea

Our little painter

The finished dragons

Olivia's dragon

Sofia's dragon

Carving Pumpkins!

This afternoon, after Sofia's 1pm soccer game we decided to carve pumpkins. I think October seems to fly by because there is so much to do throughout the month. We have yet to visit Hall's Pumpkin Patch as a family, and I really want to do it together so we can get a photo of all four of us together. Olivia had a soccer game Friday evening, followed by another game Saturday morning, and Sofia had a soccer game at 3:15pm on Saturday and then one at 1pm today, so it's been hard to fit in anything related to pumpkins. Yesterday, after Olivia's 11am soccer game we drove to Market Street so the girls could pick out their choice of pumpkins to carve. I bought a few pumpkins last week for our front entrance and our fireplace mantel, but I like the girls to figure out the "perfect" carving pumpkin for themselves. They also picked out two smaller pumpkins for the "Storybook Pumpkin Patch" at the library. Instead of carving the smaller pumpkins, the girls plan to paint them and make them into dragons for display at their school's library.

The girls moved their pumpkins onto the grass and their two neighbors and buddies, Brandon and Antonio, came over and joined in the carving. I helped Olivia draw the face on her pumpkin. At lunch that day, I drew different eyes, nose, and mouths for her to chose what she liked best and then I knew what she wanted. I drew on the face with a black Sharpie and then started cutting with our kitchen knives. First, I cut the top off and Olivia carefully cleaned out the insides. She is our girl who doesn't like her hands dirty or sticky, so she wasn't a huge fan but did a good enough job. Meanwhile, Sofia loved cleaning it out and then after all the pumpkin innards were in the two bowls I set out, she liked to mush it all together through her fingers. Sofia drew on her own pumpkin face and I cut it out for her. Brandon too drew his own pumpkin face and I cut it after it was clear he might cut off a finger! Antonio also drew on his own face and I cut for him.

Once the pumpkins were cute and done, we took a few photos of the gang and also the girls with their pumpkins. As soon as we finished, Olivia and Sofia were set on painting their smaller pumpkins for their Storybook pumpkins, and they did a great job. Buddy kept sneaking small chunks of pumpkin meat and really loved it. We set our finished pumpkins by our entrance and the girls were excited to see them at night!

Olivia starting to draw her face...until I helped out.

Scooping out their pumpkins

Sofia, Brandon and Olivia having fun.

Sofia hard at work!

Olivia cleaning out her pumpkin

Me cutting out Olivia's Jack-o-lantern face.

Olivia's finished Jack-o-lantern

Sofia drawing on her pumpkin face

Very focused!

Antonio watching as we clean out the pumpkins

Olivia ready to paint her little pumpkin

Sofia loves feeling the pumpkin innards!

Antonio's finished pumpkin

Buddy loves watching the action

The finished Jack-o-lanterns!

The girls and their Jack-o-lanterns

The girls and I

Buddy posing with the jack-o-lanterns

Buddy, the best dog in the world!

Kindergarten Field Trip to the Arboretum

Yesterday I joined Olivia and the rest of the Kindergarteners on their field trip to the Dallas Arboretum. Drake's Mom, Lindsey, drove me and Charley's mom to the Arboretum and I was able to get them both in for free with our membership. The kids had arrived on the bus shortly before we parked, so we met up with Mrs. Schultz and all the kids and split up into our chaperone groups. Olivia, Gracie and Scout were in my group and we could go and see anything we wanted. We started off in the pumpkin village and the girls enjoyed running and jumping on the hay bales, walking through the pumpkin houses and climbing on the pumpkins. I was able to get a few cute picture of my girls, although Scout wasn't interested in being in most of the pictures. She would hide or run away every time she saw me with my camera raised. Beside my iPhone I also brought my real camera and planned to take photos of the girls and the pumpkins. After enjoying the pumpkins, Olivia wanted to visit the frog fountain and along the way we found a dragon statue which Olivia and I both agreed Sofia would love to see! Not only was it a cool dragon statue, but the dragon held and was reading a book! Everything Sofia loves!

We made it to the frog fountain and Olivia kept asking if she could run through it, but I convinced her that being wet for the rest of the day wouldn't be fun. We walked down the lane with the huge crepe myrtles and met up with several other classmates before heading to the open area where we decided to have our lunch. All three of the girls were starving, even though it was only 11am. Along the way we ran into a beautiful young lady in a pink dress getting her pictures taken for her quinceanera. Each time we've visited the Dallas Arboretum we've run into at least one girl preparing for her quinceanera and both girls loved getting their pictures taken with "the princess." This time was no different and Olivia and Gracie were happy to stand next to the young girl for their photo! So cute. We continued on to our picnic spot and found the perfect area to sit. I brought my picnic blanket and set it up so Gracie, Scout, and Olivia could take off their shoes, sit down and enjoy their lunch. It was really perfect weather and we had the entire are to ourselves. I tried to get a cute photo of the girls, but Scout kept getting up and running away! I guess she really must not like pictures! After the girls finished their lunches, they ran around for a bit before we headed to the classroom for our educational portion of the visit.

All of Mrs. Schultz' students arrived at the classroom and sat down on the rug while the Arboretum volunteer explained what she does and that they would be learning about seeds and how they grow from her. She started off by reading a really sweet story about two seeds that are planted next to each other but grow into completely different plants. She made the story interactive, which the kids loved. After, they sat at tables and she walked around the room and had each child pull out one pumpkin seed from a cut pumpkin. With their seed, eat kiddo went up to the table and put it in a small seed pot and added soil. The instructor told the kids that they could take their seed home, water it and it would grow into a pumpkin vine. She then passed our a lima bean to each child and showed them how to pull it apart and explained the different areas of the seed and how it would grow into a plant, if it was put into soil. It was really interesting and she did a great job involving the kids and keeping them interested.

Once we were done, Scout, Olivia Gracie and I headed back out to the field where we'd set up our picnic and decided to explore more of the Arboretum with several of their classmates. It was getting pretty hot and the kids were getting tired, so it was good timing when we had to meet back at the front gate. We originally got confused and met at the wrong gate, so Charley's Mom Hillary, who used to be a school teacher, involved them all in a game of freeze-walk. The kids LOVED it and were completely focused on her. We made it back to the main gate, met with Mrs. Schultz and headed to the bus with our group. Olivia was sad and didn't want to say goodbye so Mrs. Schultz asked if she would sit next to her. Olivia adores Mrs. Schultz, so she quickly agreed and got on the bus. It was a fun visit, although it seemed to go by so quickly!

Pumpkins by the entrance!

Gracie, Olivia and Scout

Some of the cute Kindergardeners with the pumpkins

Gracie, Olivia and Scout among the pumpkins

Olivia and Gracie and a dragon!

Visiting the frog fountain. Olivia desperately wanted to run through the water!

Olivia and some of her sweet classmates

Gracie and Olivia meet a princess!

Having our picnic - Scout didn't want to be in the photo

Running around after eating their lunch

Gracie and Olivia

Learning about how seeds grow

Everyone gets a pumpkin seed from a pumpkin

Olivia studying a lima bean

Taking a break after pumpkins

Gracie!

Girls holding hands while we head toward the exit

Olivia and Gracie at the end of the field trip - hot and tired but still smiling

Sweet Olivia!

One last photo with pumpkins before heading back to school

Hilary leading the kids in a game of "red light, green light" They all LOVED it!